Graphical user interfaces (GUIs) are ubiquitous tools of modern computer systems. They typically include various graphical controls to permit operators to enter commands, interact with program applications and manipulate data files.
In common graphical user interface, a computer system displays various workspaces to a user populated with icons ti represent applications, documents, spreadsheets, presentations and other operator work products. Icon driven GUIs are convenient tools for system operations because they permit the operator to interact with data files in an intuitive manner—the operator might open a data file, for example, by pointing and clicking on the corresponding icon. Thus, the icons represent a convenient scheme for interacting with data files on an individual basis.
Icon-based GUIs are less convenient tools, however, when an operator needs to execute a common command upon a large collection of icons. Icons may be scattered spatially across a single workspace or, sometimes, multiple workspaces (for example, multiple folder locations in a file system). While some operating systems permit an operator to perform a multiple selection upon several icons (for example, by holding a CTRL button and selecting individual icons), the operator's selection has no persistence. If the operator releases the CTRL button and clicks on another icon, the prior multiple icon selection is discarded. If the operator selects an icon in error, the operator must repeat the entire multiple icon selection process from scratch. Thus, these icon-based GUIs can be administratively expensive to use because operators primarily interact with icons on an individual basis.
There is a need in the art for a GUI in a computer system that maintains a persistent selection of multiple data files therein. There is a further need in the art for such a system that provides a simple mechanism for maintaining and revising such selections and for entering common commands that are to be executed upon all the data files subsumed within such a selection.